Tag: communication

Effective communication is a key interpersonal skill and learning how each of us can improve our communication is beneficial to all. Communication is a two way process, so improving communication involves both how we deliver and listen to the message. To best service our customers, EXAIR has many ways to share and receive information.

There are the standard methods, of course, that have been around for years. Phone and fax are still very useful, and everyone has noticed that fax is slowly becoming less utilized. As dreaded as it may be, email is certainly a valuable way to communicate, especially as it allows ‘attachments’ such as photos, which as the saying goes, are definitely worth a thousand words. If video or 3D models are exchanged I am certain the number of words increases.

The newest technology for communication is via ‘chat’ which can be accessed from the EXAIR website. Here, you can chat with an Application Engineer and do something as simple as confirming a part number to something more involved like sizing a Cabinet Cooler System.

Chat Live with an Engineer ‘Button’

The US Postal System is still a valuable communication tool, as we send out the EXAIR Catalog (currently volume No. 30) and the EXAIR-Mail (Number 109/Fall 2016 issue just went out), and some Purchase Orders still are dropped off by the Postman.

Another method of communication is face to face. We have what we call the ‘Demo Room’ here at the factory in Cincinnati, OH. In this room, we have every type of our Intelligent Compressed Air Products, in just about every size offered, ready for demonstration and testing to your application. We’ve had visitors from all over the world come in and share face to face their applications and collaborate with us and test out the EXAIR solution.

Lastly, and since you are reading this you already are familiar with the EXAIR Blog – a great way for us to share with you our musings and thoughts, in a way that makes it a personal take on the EXAIR products and our interactions with our customers.

Effective communication is very important to us and what we do here every day. Feel free to utilize one or more of the Contact Us tools to communicate with us and we’ll be in touch!

Something doesn’t feel quite right about this past weekend. A few hundred Boy Scouts gathered along the bank of the East Fork of the Little Miami River from Friday to Sunday for our District’s Spring Camp-O-Ree…and it didn’t rain once. It totally went the wisdom of great American author, philosopher, and truth-teller Dave Barry:

Rainstorms will travel thousands of miles, against prevailing winds, for the opportunity to rain on a tent.

The beautiful weather, though, was just the icing on the cake of a glorious weekend. We set up a series of team-building/problem-solving exercises for the Scouts to perform. One of these was known as “The Hot Chocolate River” which consists of:

(2) lengths of rope, staked to the ground about 15 feet apart…these are the “banks” of the river.
(5) 2-foot wooden squares…these are the “marshmallows” that the team uses to cross the river.

Here’s the deal: each 8-Scout Patrol attempts to reach the opposite bank by placing the marshmallows in the river. At least one Scout has to be in physical contact with each marshmallow in the river, or the unattended marshmallow is removed from play, and they’re left to cross the river with just four marshmallows. Or three, when they find another way to leave one unattended. And some of them did, with alarming quickness. One Patrol (the one my youngest son belongs to) successfully crossed the river in 1:14 (min:sec). The next fastest was 1:44. Another Patrol lost three marshmallows almost immediately, but were able to get all eight members across in under seven minutes, using only two marshmallows. A couple of Patrols “timed out,” being left with only one or two marshmallows after ten minutes, with members still on the starting bank.

One thing I noticed…from the quickest (did I mention that was my son’s Patrol?) to the slowest, was that their success (or lack thereof) was tied to their teamwork and communication (or lack thereof.) These are key components of “The Patrol Method,” which I wrote about once. Well, twice.

That was a couple of years ago, and the Application Engineering team at EXAIR STILL practices The Patrol Method. It’s indispensable, whether we’re looking for a solution to a challenging application, training a new member of the team, or just getting everyone one the same page…no sense in just one of us learning something if we can ALL learn, right?

How are teamwork and communication contributing to your team’s success? Something to think about.